What Comes Before
by Cairnsy
Summary: Before he died, Fujimaki didn't do a whole lot of living.


_Warnings:_ Death fic, sort of.  
_Notes:_ Based on the awesome drama CD story where Yuri makes the characters write their own radio plays and then act them out. Fujimaki's play (starring himself and Matsushita) sparked my curiosity especially, and made me wonder if it was partly referential. There were certainly a couple of parallels with the series, and since we don't know how he died, I'm going with this version.

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**What Comes Before.**

_The original draft of Fujimaki's play was slightly more autobiographical._

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This story doesn't start with once upon a time. Once Upon a Times belong to princesses and illegitimate princes, to anti-heroes and idols. While Once Upon a Times do tend to favour protagonists brought up in broken homes and by broken minds, any Once Upon a Time worth its weight in salt would turn its nose up at a dead beat protagonist who ended up dead and beaten in a gutter.

This story doesn't have a one upon a time but it does have an 'end', one that begins when our hero is seven years old. It is at this age that an appropriately dark and stormy night steals away the boy's parents, marking a pitiful end to two lives that had slithered through life on the back of illicit ventures and misbegotten smarm.

The end. The end of our protagonist's vaguely normal, albeit volatile, childhood. The end of any possibility of said protagonist growing into anything other than a surly, confrontational teenager. The End, with a capital T and a capital E.

For what it is worth, our protagonist doesn't give up on his own life quite that easily, but that's hardly because of any great resilience or inner strength on his behalf. Instead, he fights on for several more years because he's too fucking stupid to realise that his own short story has already concluded, and that he has been relegated to a mere supporting character in his older brother's epic, best selling novel.

Let's call the older brother Shiki.

Shiki's story begins with a once upon a time. A young man devastated by the deaths of his parents, Shiki has no choice but to drop out of his promising car mechanic apprenticeship and raise his younger brother. Shiki is the sort of down trodden, selfless protagonist that fairy tales are made for. Of course, Shiki's fairytale doesn't mention that he would have been fired from his apprenticeship for theft and other such misdemeanours if his parents hadn't passed away at such a conveniently time. Nor does the fairy tale make note of the fact that the very nice check that Shiki receives each month for his useless little bother is subsidised by a little bit of dabbling and dibbling in the Princess White Powder and Count Cocaine.

Because Shiki is the hero, it is clearly beneath him to ever get his own hands dirty when dealing with such royalty. What are younger brothers for if not to run around at all hours of the night collecting payments and dropping off a delivery or two? Baby brother is too thick to stay in school, and it's not like he ever manages to hold down an actual job for more than a few weeks. No, brainless labour suits him perfectly.

It's simply a bonus that he gets to break the occasional kneecap or two.

Rather fittingly then, that our protagonist's more traditional End comes violently. He fucks up a delivery, and everything ends up going to straight to hell. The drugs are gone, the money is gone, and if that isn't bad enough (and it's fucking bad), there's a knife buried in his chest.

It's difficult enough navigating the dark streets on a good night, and this is not a good night.

Still, he manages to stumble home. Don't bother asking how; he doesn't have a fucking clue. He even makes it one-two-three up the steps to the front door of their apartment, but twisting the handle is just that little bit beyond him. Instead, he slides down the battered metal door, a small groan escaping through his lips as something _catches_ inside of him.

He can hear the television going through the door. He can hear his brother cooking dinner and talking on the phone, can hear him sing along drunkenly to some stupid American album.

Any minute now, his brother will realise that his screw-up of a younger brother is late and will come looking for him. Any minute now the door will swing open and said screw-up will be rushed to another emergency hospital room under another fake name.

Any minute now.

Ha.

Do you have any idea what it's like to drown in your own blood? It fucking hurts.

And it takes hours.

The boy dies.

And his Happily Ever After begins.

The strange new world he is born into is brimming with people just like him, people whose End came long before their actual deaths, people who left behind nothing more than a dirty smudge on their previous world. The boy rebels against the people in this life just as strongly and as violently as he did the people in his last; just because everything else in this world is shiny and new doesn't mean that he is anything more than tarnished brass.

He joins the rebellion because it is something to do, and not at all because the thought of being reincarnated into his previous life scares him shitless. Oh, he knows that the others join because it's the just and right thing to do, but our hero has never been strong on moral journeys and spiritual growth.

When he learns that dying in this world just means you wake up with a soul splitting headache a couple of hours later, he stops caring even about the bullets and knives that seem constantly aimed at his head, his chest, his heart.

It's why he doesn't understand what the big idiot (Mitsu? Let's go with that) is thinking when Mitsu steps in front of him one afternoon and takes a series of deadly blades meant for _him._ It's not like there is any point. If there is one thing that he learnt in his first go at life, it is that there is never any point.

It's not like anybody gives a damn.

Right?

When Mitsu wakes up, your hero and mine rewards Mitsu's stupid, selfless act with a black eye.

They have lunch together the next day. Begrudgingly, the boy uses his own food coupons for them both.

It's … it's a start. What exactly it's supposed to be the start of our protagonist has no fucking idea, he rarely ever does. Maybe the fact it's a start of any kind is enough.

Bah. 'Once upon a time, two young, dead boys had lunch together' is a pretty piss poor start to any story, but it's going to have to do.

**~oOo~**

"So, what do you think?" Fujimaki asked wearily, his hands stuffed deep into his pockets.

"It's perfect!" Yuri enthused, flicking back through the script. "I mean, it's not as good as the story I've written, but it's much better than what I was expecting from you. That said-"

Fujimaki gaze narrowed as Yuri pulled a pen out of thin air and started scribbling in the margins.

"- maybe it would be a bit better with a few changes. Just little ones."

He shrugged. "Whatever. As long as I don't have to do any more work, you can do what you like with it."

"Just little changes," Yuri murmured again, oblivious to Fujimaki's irritated eye-roll. He doubted she still knew he was even in the room. "I think it needs a little bit more action, and maybe some guns! Guns are always cool! And what if there were ninjas … no, that's just stupid. Ninjas use swords, not guns. Ooh, how about if the characters were all part of the mafia!"

Yuri giggled then, and Fujimaki flinched. Anytime Yuri giggled like that, bad things happened – and usually to the poor idiot who just happened to be in the same room with her at the time. Clearly escape was the only option available to him. Edging slowly backwards, Fujimaki swiped his shirasaya up from the far couch and slipped unnoticed from the room. With a quietness that was frankly beneath him, Fujimaki pulled the door closed before sagging back against it with a satisfied (and maybe just a touch relieved) huff.

"You survived then?"

Only to jump a mile into the air half a second later.

"What the hell, Matsushita?" Fujimaki spluttered, his eyes shooting open as he leaned forward and dragged the tall boy down by his shirt collar so that they were face to face. "Are you _trying_ to get me killed? I almost had a freaking heart attack."

"Oh no," Matsushita replied evenly. "That would have been terrible. I apologise."

"Tch." Fujimaki pushed the bigger boy away, unimpressed with his dead-on-arrival humour. Why the others were so convinced that Matsushita was some gentle giant who farted nothing but rainbows, Fuijimaki had no idea. "Idiot. Buy me lunch, I'm out of coupons. You can tell me how badly Yuri butchered your story over some noodles – you won't _believe_ what she plans to do to mine-"

**~oOo~**

This story doesn't start with a once upon a time, nor does it really have an end. What it does have for the first time is a now.

And that now? Is pretty fucking good.


End file.
